create_zbuffer(3alleg4)

💖 create_zbuffer — the Allegro manual, but make it make sense 💖

okay bestie, so this one's from the Allegro manual, section 3alleg4, and it's about the Allegro game programming library. yes, the actual Allegro. the one your uncle used. she's iconic, she's still serving, let's go 🎀

✨ NAME ✨

create_zbuffer — literally just makes a Z-buffer for a bitmap. that's it. that's the whole job. Allegro game programming library, no cap 💅

✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

#include <allegro.h>

ZBUFFER *create_zbuffer(BITMAP *bmp);

🌸 DESCRIPTION 🌸

so the way this works: you hand it a BITMAP, and it creates a ZBUFFER sized to match whatever you're planning to draw on. that's the vibe. the Z-buffer just matches your bitmap's dimensions, because obviously, why would you depth-sort into a different size, that's giving chaos 🦋

here's the tea though — and this part is highkey important: you can define several Z-buffers. like, as many as you want. go off. BUT. only one of them can be used at the same time. so the one you actually want to be working right now? you have to call set_zbuffer() to make that Z-buffer the active one. otherwise it's just sitting there, existing, doing absolutely nothing. main character energy but with no screen time 😭

⭐ RETURN VALUE ⭐

• returns the pointer to the ZBUFFER 🫶
• or NULL if there was an error 💀 (rip)

and bestie, listen — remember to destroy the ZBUFFER once you are done with it, okay? destroy_zbuffer() is right there. don't leave her hanging. memory leaks are not cute and they are not the vibe. free your buffers, periodt 💅✨

🌈 SEE ALSO 🌈

• create_sub_zbuffer(3alleg4)
• set_zbuffer(3alleg4)
• clear_zbuffer(3alleg4)
• destroy_zbuffer(3alleg4)
• exzbuf(3alleg4)

go read those next, they're all in the same friend group 💜

okay that's the whole page!! this one's from Allegro, version 4.4.3, and it's filed under create_zbuffer(3alleg4). slay, go build something with depth 🧚💖